NY Times‘ Nate Silver Tells Colbert How Much He Hates Pundits: I’d Rather ‘Vote For Ebola’

On Monday, Comedy Central’s Stephen Colbert sat down with New York Times writer and statistician Nate Silver to discuss his predictions for this election, his distaste for the punditry, and his attempt to make a bet with MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough.

Silver noted his distaste for TV pundits — he even admitted that he’d rather vote for ebola (“or third party”) than a pundit — prompting Colbert to ask why he wanted to put pundits out of work. After all, the host added, “CNN doesn’t need any more help.”

You might also recall that Silver bet Scarborough $1,000 (for charity) that his predictive model would prove correct. Scarborough didn’t, ultimately, take the bet, but he did donate to charity anyway. Silver explained that he’d made the bet to sort of prove his conviction and to put his money where his mouth is, essentially.